Telangana Elections: Uttam Kumar files for ticket, predicts more than 70 seats win for Congress

Hyderabad: Nalgonda MP and former TPCC president Capt N Uttam Kumar Reddy expressed confidence that the Congress party would win more than 70 seats in the upcoming Telangana Assembly elections.

Uttam Kumar Reddy and his wife, former MLA N Padmavathi, submitted their applications for Congress party tickets from Huzurnagar and Kodad Assembly constituencies at Gandhi Bhavan on Friday. Later, Uttam Kumar Reddy held a press conference at Gandhi Bhavan and addressed Congress leaders.

Uttam Kumar Reddy expressed confidence that the Congress party would win all 12 seats in Nalgonda district, giving them a clean sweep. He said that the Telangana Assembly elections could be held on November 30, and the Congress would come to power in Telangana in the first week of December.

He predicted that the Congress would win Assembly elections in all five states of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Mizoram, and Telangana, which would be held this year, and a victory in these five states would be a major step towards winning the 2024 general elections and making Rahul Gandhi the prime minister.

KCR’s promises are a scam, alleges Uttam

The Congress leader accused the Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao of failing on all fronts. He said that the people of Telangana would teach the ruling BRS a fitting lesson in the coming elections. He alleged that KCR did not provide the promised three acres of land to Dalits and tribals in Telangana. He also said that the double-bedroom scheme was a scam, with only a few units being constructed. He said that the BRS leaders are indulging in huge corruption to allot units.

Uttam Kumar Reddy also accused KCR of cheating Muslims on the promise of a 12 per cent reservation. He said that KCR had lied to the Assembly in 2014, claiming that he had spoken to prime minister Narendra Modi and that the latter had agreed to provide 12 per cent reservation for Muslims. He said that the 4 per cent Muslim reservation given by the previous Congress regime is still continuing and that the KCR government had not been able to increase it even by 1 per cent.

Dismissing the claims of development being made by KCR, Uttam Kumar Reddy said that Telangana was number one only in per capita debt, per capita liquor consumption, and corruption. He said that the per capita debt of Telangana at the time of its formation was about Rs 18,157 crore. With Telangana’s debts increasing to over Rs 4 lakh crore, the per capita debt has increased by almost five times to about Rs 1,20,000 crore.

‘BRS leaders using power to silence dissent'

He pointed out KCR had promised to make a Dalit the chief minister of Telangana. However, the Dalit leader who was made the deputy chief minister in 2014 was denied a ticket in the recent elections. The Madigas, another major Dalit community, were also not given any representation in the state Cabinet. “Not a single ticket was given to the Mudiraj community, an important BC community in Telangana,” he said.

Uttam Kumar Reddy alleged that BRS MLAs were treating their constituencies as personal fiefdoms and engaging in widespread corruption. He accused them of looting Telangana through the sand, land, mine, and wine mafias. He also claimed that BRS leaders were misusing the police to harass political opponents and suppress dissent against their corruption. He further alleged that the BRS MLAs had formed ‘gangs of thieves’ to control these mafias.

‘BRS leaders taking commission from Dalit Bandhu beneficiaries’

The Congress leader alleged that BRS leaders were taking huge bribes from the beneficiaries of the Dalit Bandhu and double-bedroom houses schemes. He said that these schemes had been turned into major scams by the BRS leaders, who were more interested in exploiting the people than in developing them. He claimed that the bribes were being taken even before the money was transferred to the beneficiaries.

“Several beneficiaries of the Dalit Bandhu scheme from the Gudibandi village of Kodad spoke out at the press conference at Gandhi Bhavan. They described how the local BRS leaders had forced them to pay bribes of up to Rs 5 lakhs out of the Rs 10 lakhs they were supposed to receive from the scheme,” alleged Uttam.

“The Dalit Bandhu and BC Bandhu schemes are just for show,” he said. “In the Huzurnagar and Kodad constituencies, BRS leaders took commissions from the beneficiaries of the Dalit Bandhu scheme. They took a 50 per cent commission out of the Rs 10 lakhs that were supposed to go to the eligible beneficiaries. When I filed a complaint as an MP to the district collector, he did not respond,” Uttam said.

The Congress leader said that when the Dalit Bandhu scheme was launched during the Huzurabad by-elections, he had asked KCR to allocate Rs 1.7 lakh crore to extend the benefit to all 17 lakh Dalit families in the state. However, he alleged that the scheme was being implemented only on a symbolic basis in order to cheat the entire Dalit community.

‘Mission Bhagiratha, a major scam’

He alleged that Mission Bhagiratha, the flagship water supply scheme of the BRS government, was a major scam. He said that the government’s claims of supplying tap water to all households were false and that the scheme had only been used to take loans and embezzle money. He also said that the real development in Telangana had occurred only during the Congress regime, when major irrigation projects such as Nagarjuna Sagar were constructed and electricity, roads, and other infrastructure were built.

‘KCR believes in use and throw politics’

The Congress leader said that the BRS was a family party and that KCR, the party’s president, announced the tickets for the upcoming elections without seeking any applications. He contrasted this with the Congress, which he said was a democratic party that had invited applications for tickets and would discuss, scrutinise, and finalise them after due consultation. He said that KCR had made a big mistake by unilaterally announcing the candidates.

Uttam Kumar Reddy said that KCR’s decision to contest from two seats was a clear indication that he was afraid of losing the elections. He said that KCR has a history of deceiving his allies and that he believed in ‘use and throw’ politics.

The Congress leader also questioned the BRS government’s silence over Andhra Pradesh’s illegal drawing of Krishna water from Srisailam backwaters through the Pothireddypadu expansion project. He said that this would cause huge losses to the farmers of undivided Nalgonda and Khammam districts.